


Black as the Ink You Use to Sign Your Name

by Hyarmaite



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Gen, General, I researched nothing I'm so sorry, Mae every promise you make ends in tragedy don't do that, post-Thangorodrim discussions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-10
Updated: 2017-07-10
Packaged: 2018-11-30 10:22:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11461614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hyarmaite/pseuds/Hyarmaite
Summary: Maglor isn't sure who the person who's come back to him is. Maedhros thinks they need to stop pretending they're not what they are.





	Black as the Ink You Use to Sign Your Name

“Who are you?” Maglor asks one day, brushing the hair out of his brother’s eyes. “Sometimes I can’t tell, between the Oath, and the…the-“

“The scars,” Maedhros replies nonchalantly, the comment bouncing off of him like it’s nothing. “Of course.”

“That doesn’t answer my question,” Maglor presses on with less tact than he usually displays. “Who are you, if not the brother I last saw here on the shores of the new world? My oldest friend and truest confidant?”

Maedhros snorts, turning back to his parchment. “No need to wax poetic, brother mine. If I was too stupid to understand your words before Angband, then I am too impatient by far to comprehend them now.”

“This is what I mean!” Maglor slams his hands down on the desk, upsetting the inkwell and sending a river of jet black ink down the table and into his brother’s lap. Maedhros doesn’t flinch: he hasn't flinched since his return, not once. “You forsake the kingship of the Noldor, a move our father would never have taken, and yet it seems with every passing day the fire within you threatens to out-burn even his… On the days where it does burn, and you’re not just _cold_.”

Maedhros sits in silence, hands in his lap, his head turned away from his brother but held up proudly. The only sound in the room is the slow drip of ink to the floor.

“Sometimes I swear I see the reflection of the enemy in your eyes,” Maglor continues, voice growing hushed and desperate, “like they’re looking through you, at us, like they’re still-“

“Kano.” Maedhros’ voice is razor-thin and hard as steel. “Do you think, do you _really think_ we can pretend to be what we were? Who am I?” He stands, drawing himself up to his full height, the rest of the ink spilling off his robes and to the floor, entirely ignored. “You should be asking yourself the same question.”

Maglor draws back, eyes going wide. Maedhros feels his resolve give, only a little, at the fear in his brother’s face, yet he does not back down. “But-“

“We swore a binding Oath,” Maedhros continues, eyes glinting in the low evening light. “We spilled the blood of our kin on the shores of Alqualonde and burned their hope at Losgar. Our history has been carved in blood and flame from the moment our father took up the cry and we added our voices to his on the wind. You ask if the enemy looks through my eyes? Nay, we are the enemy now, come to this land. To pretend that we are still as we were is foolish, and to seek to become what we were is naïve. No, we must continue on knowing the choices we’ve made and those we’ve hurt.”

He holds his younger brother’s gaze for a moment, Maglor’s mouth slightly agape, and then he smiles ever so slightly.

“So, no,” he replies, taking a cloth off the table and getting to his knees to properly clean the ink from the floor. “In answer to your earlier question, I know at least that I am not he who set out with hope in his heart from Valinor, nor am I he who stood aside at the burning of the ships at Losgar, or he who was held captive upon Thangorodrim. I am all of these and more, as are you.” He presses his lips into a thin line, concentrating on his scrubbing. “I am he who made my brothers worry and suffer in anguish for years, because I was too foolhardy to ignore the Oath and father’s dying words singing in my blood. I am he who abandoned his dearest friend, only to have the same friend risk his very body and soul to bring me back on the _chance_ that I still drew breath. I am left-handed and kinslayer and dispossessed, the shortest king in the history of the Noldor but perhaps not the worst.”

Maglor snorts, the anger from earlier entirely abated. “Look who’s waxing poetic now, brother. I think this is the most I’ve heard you speak since your return.”

“I’m feeling rather chatty,” Maedhros admits, from the floor. “Pick up your foot, Kano, there’s ink under your heel.”

Maglor feels the tension leave his body. “God, maybe you _haven’t_ changed. You’re the same mother hen you’ve always been.”

“I suppose,” Maedhros quips from the floor. “Though I shall have to ask for help with a few of the usual household chores: it’s nigh impossible to fold clothing with just one hand.”

“Ha! Good luck getting any of our brothers to help you there. Perhaps you are right, and we have all changed, but none so much as to get those five to do laundry.”

“Does Tyelko even wash his clothes? He smells so strongly of dog I cannot tell.”

“At least that’s a constant,” Maglor says with a huff. “Now, that’s enough floor scrubbing for a prince of the Noldor. I’ve quite forgiven you for making me sick with worry so often, as I know you cannot help it, and I’m sure we cause you just as much distress.” He holds out his hand to Maedhros, who gratefully accepts the offer and rises to his feet.

“There wasn’t a day in that place that I didn’t wonder if you were alright,” he says, suddenly sober, but Maedhros seems to realize that this is too serious, and he continues on. “I couldn’t help but wonder, ‘Goodness, who will do the cooking now that I am gone? Surely not Kano, he’s too busy with his compositions. Will they remember to eat at all, I wonder?’”

“We managed!” Maglor cries, a laugh bubbling past his lips. “Barely, but we did.”

“And I am glad of it!” Maedhros clasps him on the shoulder, grip tightening slightly.

“For if I am anything,” he says, voice low and serious again to the point where Maglor knows he means to keep the words, “I will be he who does not leave you all to fear and worry, never again.”

Maglor knocks his brother’s hand off his shoulder, and for a moment Maedhros’ face falls at the rejection. But Maglor hugs him swiftly, wrapping his arms around his brother’s middle and clinging on, burying his face in Maedhros’ chest as if they were children again.

“And I will hold you to it,” is all the more he says on the matter.

**Author's Note:**

> I didn't research this at all so if anything is out of order or factually incorrect I'm so sorry.


End file.
